[ssba]
I died . . . I Came Back . . . Whatever
Reviewed by Paul Birchall
The Complex
Through June 27
Cyanne McClairian’s solo show is inspired by her memories of “dying” (for a while) during heart transplant surgery. In her monologue, McClairian, a cheerful, vibrant performer with a history of genuinely horrifying congenital ailments, undergoes heart surgery – but has a complication, during which she wakes up in the Afterlife.
Although she must endure the requisite flashbacks of her life story, fortunately for her (and for us), the trip to Heaven’s Waiting Room is less an eternal sentence than it is a quick vacation pit stop.
Director Jessica Lynn Johnson’s haltingly paced production is unable to shake an inappropriate oddness, which has less to do with the life after death premise than it does with the peculiar incidents McClairian chooses to realize. They just seem like a random collection of memories: her prissy high school drama teacher, a spacy boyfriend from a Renn Faire summer dalliance, a half-baked conversation with Sir Lawrence Olivier, who appears as her guardian angel. The result is perplexing and prosaic, rather than moving, top heavy with clichés of the Alex Malarkey variety.
The Complex, 6472 Santa Monica Blvd., Hlywd.; through June 27. https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/2123
Sleeping Around
Reviewed by Paul Birchall
Theatre Asylum
Through June 25
RECOMMENDED:
Playwright Cesar Abella’s romantic drama is a La Ronde-style tale of irony and sexual frustration. A man (Jim Martyka) and a woman (Sammi Lappin) meet for a sordid Craigslist hook up that descends into unexpected emotional connection. Shortly afterwards, the man tells his cancer-afflicted wife (Courtney Sara Bell) about the dalliance. Later, the wife picks up a shy, virginal grad student (Lee Pollero) for bucket list reasons of her own. A man (Eric Cire) has a gay tryst with his long lost best friend (Gregory Crafts), who is then seen breaking up with his long term girlfriend (Jenn Scuderi Crafts).
Although the acrobatics of the narrative line connecting the vignettes in Abella’s drama become increasingly formulaic in a wearisome way, the script’s writing is generally quick witted and smart. Some vignettes are intense, with the shortness of length belying the sophisticated plotting, though others seem like connective tissue to transition us from one character to the next.
Director Wendy Gough Soroka’s production wisely places its attention on character subtext; it’s particularly interesting how the psychological underpinnings of each character remain centered, even when they at first appear to be contradictory. Martyka and Bell’s sequence is particularly powerful – and so is the nicely pitched emotional scene between Cire and Crafts.
Theatre Asylum, 6320 Santa Monica Blvd., Hlywd.; Through June 25.
https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/2444
